Product description

"An outstanding work ... the [soccer] book of the decade." --Sunday Business Post "Inverting the Pyramid" is a pioneering soccer book that chronicles the evolution of soccer tactics and the lives of the itinerant coaching geniuses who have spread their distinctive styles across the globe. Through Jonathan Wilson's brilliant historical detective work we learn how the South Americans shrugged off the British colonial order to add their own finesse to the game; how the Europeans harnessed individual technique and built it into a team structure; how the game once featured five forwards up front, while now a lone striker is not uncommon. "Inverting the Pyramid" provides a definitive understanding of the tactical genius of modern-day Barcelona, for the first time showing how their style of play developed from Dutch "Total Football," which itself was an evolution of the Scottish passing game invented by Queens Park in the 1870s and taken on by Tottenham Hotspur in the 1930s. Inverting the Pyramid has been called the "Big Daddy" (Zonal Marking) of soccer tactics books; it is essential for any coach, fan, player, or fantasy manager of the beautiful game

Author information

Jonathan Wilson is the author of seven books. "Inverting the Pyramid" was named NSC Football Book of the Year in 2009 and won the Premio Antonio Ghirelli prize as Italian soccer book of the year in 2013. His books "Behind the Curtain: Travels in Eastern European Football"; "The Anatomy of England"; and "The Outsider: A History of the Goalkeeper" were shortlisted for the NSC award in 2007, 2011, and 2013. Wilson is the founder and editor of the soccer quarterly "The Blizzard," writes for the "Guardian," SI.com, the "National," FoxSoccer, and "Sports Illustrated," and is a columnist for "World Soccer." He was voted Football Writer of the Year by the Football Supporters Federation in 2012.